The Thankful Goat: A Micro-Farm Flourishes (With Recipe)

Reader Contribution by Tori Degen
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A napkin. That’s what prompted her first farm vision. It was January 2010, and Dawn Mathews had purchased her first goat, Athena, a few months prior. A woman, a goat, and a really big dream scribbled out on a napkin. Dawn is the first to admit that she had no idea what she was getting into.

Fast forward to four years later, and today you’ll find Farmer Dawn and her family running their flourishing farm, The Thankful Goat, in Granite Falls, North Carolina.

Soon after she and her husband Steve began saying “Good night” to the goats each evening, they realized “the girls” would shout back something that sounded very similar to “Thaaaaaanks!” so they appropriately named their farm in honor of the gratitude their goats expressed. And the Mathewses themselves have plenty they are thankful for. They have meat rabbits, dairy goats, ducks, laying hens and a three-season garden that contains “any vegetable you can think of.” Dawn makes hand-crafted goat milk soaps, lip balms, lotions and bath products, while milking and making cheese from her girls’ milk . . . all on one half acre.

Running a WWOOF USA Farm

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